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Good transportation is vital to the health, and wealth, of a city. In the horse-drawn past, rivers were the major highways. Many of the world’s premier cities, like London, Shanghai and New York, grew up along a river. Rivers made the transportation of goods easier and often faster. Boats were cheaper to build than long roads.
Today, rivers are still important, but roads have become easier to build. Vehicles have also become faster and more powerful than the wagons drawn by a team of horses. The interstate highway system in the United States, and similar systems in other countries, are vital connections between cities. We take for granted these roads and the large trucks that use them. Cities depend on highways. In fact, most large cities hold junctions of several highways.
In ancient Israel, large, navigable rivers did not exist. Trade was conducted over roads. Like today, some cities stood at the junction of major trade routes. One such city was Gezer. It sat on the junction of the road from the seaport Joppa to Jerusalem and the international trade route connecting Egypt with Mesopotamia. It is mentioned fourteen times in the bible.
Archaeologists discovered Gezer and have studied it since the early 1900s. One important find was a calendar carved into a small limestone tablet. It may be the oldest known Hebrew inscription. Again, archaeology confirms the existence of Gezer.* One more fact showing you can trust the bible.
*Nosson Shulman, “Unique Sites of Israel Blog: Biblical Gezer,” JewishPress.com, May 15, 2022, https://www.jewishpress.com/blogs/unique-sites-israel/unique-sites-of-israel-blog-biblical-gezer/2022/05/15/
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Bumper music “Landing Place” performed by Mark July, used under license from Shutterstock.